Your average Arizona Fall League pitcher has something to prove. MLB teams often shy away from sending their best arms if they can help it. Because the AFL takes place about a month after minor-league seasons conclude, many top pitching prospects have already reached their innings limit by the time it begins. Those who do land in the desert are either making up for innings lost to injury or looking to up their stock, whether it be with their organization or potential future suitors.
All easier said than done. Professional baseball in November is a hitter’s game. This year, the average OPS was .807 and teams averaged more than six runs per game. In that environment, Texas Rangers pitching prospect Josh Stephan has emerged as a notable exception to the typically inflated ERAs for starters in the league.
Having grown up 10 minutes away from Globe Life Field, he’s always been a Rangers fan. Wearing a Rangers uniform at the AFL got him a step closer to his childhood dream of playing for the team, several years after he signed for a mere $20,000 as one of only 17 undrafted high school prospects to do so in 2020, when the MLB Draft was shortened to five rounds amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tuesday, the Rangers will need to add him to the 40-man roster or risk losing him via the Rule 5 Draft in December.
“It’s in my mind, of course,” Stephan said. “Obviously, I’m a hometown kid … so it would be a dream to be realized. But I like to go out there and compete, no matter what the circumstances are, whether it’s a 40-man roster spot on the line, no matter what it is.”
Stephan, 23, knew what was at stake when he got to Arizona, and the numbers showed as much. Entering Saturday’s championship game between the Surprise Saguaros and the Salt River Rafters, his 20 innings pitched, across three starts and six total appearances, led the AFL while he also managed the second-lowest ERA (2.25) and the third-lowest WHIP (1.00). Only three other starters boasted a sub-3.00 ERA in the six-team league, which averaged nearly 13 runs per game and more than two home runs per game.
Getting the nod Saturday, Stephan logged a four-inning start in which he allowed two earned runs, struck out four and walked one for a Saguaros team that ultimately finished runner-up to the Rafters in a low-scoring 3-2 loss.
Stephan’s AFL showing may not determine the Rangers’ plans for him, but at the very least, he reminded people in the organization what he’s capable of when healthy. A stress fracture in his back and a season-ending UCL sprain forced Stephan to miss time in each of his past two minor-league seasons. The last time he pitched a full season’s workload was in 2022, when he posted a solid 3.14 ERA in 103 1/3 innings between Low A and High A.
“It’s definitely taken into consideration,” Rangers pitching coordinator Jordan Tiegs said of evaluating Stephan’s AFL outings. “Whether it changes what we’re going to do or not, I can’t really speak on that. … I wouldn’t say it necessarily changes our mind that much in terms of the Rule 5 stuff, or what we’re doing. We know what we have in Josh and we’re good with that.”
Ranked by The Athletic’s Keith Law as the Rangers’ 10th-best prospect coming into the season, Stephan possesses a four-pitch mix that thrives on command as opposed to power. His low-90s sinker and cutter aren’t particularly devastating. But he’s got decent to good movement on all of his pitches, including his plus slider.
Rangers player development had Stephan prioritize regaining a feel for his slider, considering he had last pitched in July before arriving in Arizona.
Stephan exceeded expectations on that front, according to his Double-A pitching coach Jon Goebel, who accompanied him to the AFL as part of the Surprise Saguaros staff. Specifically, Goebel pointed out how well Stephan adjusted to the baseball used in the AFL that is also used in the majors and Triple A, which has always been distinctly different from the one in Double A — and sometimes frustratingly so.
“His stuff is better with the big-league ball,” Goebel said.
“It’s tough on guys sometimes because you go from Double A to Triple A, it’s a different baseball and all of a sudden you have pitches doing different things.”
Although Stephan has yet to throw a pitch at a level higher than Double A, he’s done well for himself in the AFL, which in years past has seemed to serve as a launchpad for the select few who performed well on the bump in warm-weather ballparks. Eight AFL pitchers from last season alone also hadn’t played beyond Double A and now find themselves on major-league rosters.
Maybe it will be with the Rangers, as he always envisioned. Maybe not. But Stephan, assigned a 2025 ETA to reach the majors by MLB.com, has put himself on a path to join The Show soon enough.
“If you go out there and have a lot of success, you can’t not leave there with a ton of confidence going into the next season, knowing that I just got a lineup of household names every time I took the mound out there,” Tiegs said. “Why would you not believe you can pitch in the big leagues the next year?”
(Photo: Norm Hall / MLB Photos via Getty Images)
